Paris is wow – Part Deux
Paris is a very walkable city.
We were lucky with beautiful weather and took full advantage by doing as much on foot as possible. The French obviously appreciate a fine aesthetic and their city reflects that. Paris is dotted with well kept gardens, just a few clear bike paths, mini forest walks, and of course many of their buildings are as much art as architecture. On our way to more established sight-seeing destinations we took our time wandering through a garden of plants which had the loveliest, and largest, lotus blossoms we’d ever seen.
We made it to the impressive Notre Dame and stood in awe of the massive structure.
But as we walked around towards the front plaza we saw something equally impressive, if not totally unexpected: a man carving a clay portrait head of Michael Jackson. A very keen likeness too. Not for sale, just for his own artistic expression. Why was he sitting in front of Notre Dame? How are the two linked? Perhaps that’s for the artist alone to know.
Later that evening we met up with Annie for an evening moonlight walk along the Seine. First we stopped and bought a bottle of champagne (2.00€) for a romantic plastic-cup sipping. We filled our cups, made a toast, and started strolling.
Walking along the Seine on a warm Paris night is pure magic, and everything was covered in a warm glow partly from the moon and partly from the lit Eiffel Tower.
And if things weren’t beautiful enough, then the Eiffel Tower began to sparkle!!!
The next day Annie made it to the famous cabaret venue Moulin Rouge and took these pictures there:
On to the Louvre where Christine spent the better part of a morning in full enjoyment of the Mona Lisa and other breathtaking works of art. Jon joined up later, but made a side trip to a church to see the organ performance previously mentioned.
And then as it happened we were in Paris on the day the Tour de France was scheduled to roll in! We stationed ourselves on the wall over the entrance ramp where the cyclists would be ascending up from the mouth of a tunnel. We started our wait about an hour before the scheduled arrival time, but people were queued up long before we were, using the event as a great reason to have a block party.
You could buy pretty much anything with “le Tour de France” printed on it.
The streets were blocked off for miles with people on the sidelines waiting two or three deep for the riders to arrive.
Christine and Annie were standing directly in some bushes in order to gain front-row access. Jon was a bit more reserved and thus avoided getting branch related scrapes and cuts all over his shins. But here we waited for a few hours in great anticipation.
As the rumoured time approached we were excited to see the racers arrive, but little did we know that long before Mr. Armstrong or any other riders were even close to city center we’d have to wait out the endless parade of rolling advertisers….
But finally here they came!
As quickly as they arrived, they zoomed by and were gone again. No doubt about it, it was a real thrill to see the Tour de France speed by the Louvre and on to the Champs de Elysees.
Our time in Paris was fantastic. We saw the major attractions, sure, but there’s a feel about Paris that’s indescribable and – yes – romantic. You hear about it all the time and we’d both dismissed it before actually going there, something we’d not planned to do but are really glad we did. Paris is, indeed, WOW.
Tags: 2009-July, Annie, Paris, Tag Index
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